Christmas Interlude Of Sorts
by MisfiredSynapse
Summary: Kia and the Doctor celebrate their first Christmas of sorts. "The Doctor smiled, and tugged me up and out the door. There was so much to see and though we had all of time and space at our disposal, why not begin straight away?"


Merry Christmas, everyone! Enjoy the slightly Christmassy feel to this 'Christmas Interlude, Of Sorts'.

* * *

"About time," he grumbled good-naturedly as I re-entered the console room. I eyed his attire for a moment but didn't comment on the complete lack of changes- if he thought he'd blend in that way, I wouldn't bother trying to protest. He was, as much as I hated to admit it, so much cleverer than me when it came to… well, everything, so I kept my mouth shut and followed him to the door. I braced myself for the onslaught of the cold, but found the exterior of the TARDIS utterly different from the last time we'd left it.

There was no snow, for one thing, and though the breeze was a little cold it wasn't biting. He'd moved us- for my pleasure or his, I didn't know, but I appreciated it all the same. He placed a hand on my elbow and guided me along the concrete path beside the near-empty road.

Curiosity bubbled and burned inside, though I was determined not to make conversation just yet. I wanted to observe and deduce where we were- I was on a bit of a Sherlock Holmes kick- but, no matter how hard I tried, the questions came tumbling out as I caught a whiff of something decidedly spicy and crispy and indescribably _good; _it smelt like pure happiness dipped in laughter and joy, and though I couldn't pinpoint the base ingredient from this distance, I did know I wanted to try it. "What _is_ that smell?" I asked softly, my eyes closed as I tried to follow it. "Where are we, by the way? Are we still on Smishea? It doesn't look anything like Smishea from last night. Last night was bitter, and now it's... not so. Still cold, but not _cold-_cold. Did you move us? When did you do that? Is this still Smirlance? What's that noise? Oh, look at that vehicle, it hovers! It's stunning and-"

"Dangerous, if you get too close," he caught me before I could step off the red concrete onto the green, rocky surface that provided a road for the shiny contraption containing three light-blue-skinned humanoids. It rumbled like a TARDIS, but had no wheels and one anchored steering system and left behind a revolting smell- worse than petrol. "It's called a _graalm_; popular mode of transport for this lot," the Doctor continued, and I forgot myself as I smiled broadly at a couple of passing Smisheans. Their pace sped up just a little and the Doctor chuckled at my bemused expression.

"Oh, they're brilliant, they are," I said, grinning broadly as I imitated the Smisheans in checking the road, then stepping out bravely with the Doctor a second or two behind. I almost- _almost- _forgot who I was with, as I took in the sights of Smirlance. "For such a new race, they're fantastic!" I was overjoyed now at the chance to study them closer- if there was one thing that delighted a history nerd beyond anything else, it was the chance to see something new.

"Completely," the Doctor agreed. He was steering us slowly towards the Smirlancean equivalent of a chip shop at the end of the road, and although I had caught another taste of the delicious smell it was emitting, I was much more preoccupied by the clothes and shoes and food in the windows of the shops before it.

"Oh! That's just... just... fantastic!" I called suddenly, bringing him back to the present, back to me. My nose was pressed against the glass of- oh, God help him- a toy shop, and I was staring at a model of the galaxy we were in; all of the planets revolved on their own around the centre star, their sun, which revolved around a bigger star- the second sun. I took a deep breath and my stomach rumbled loudly, a little painful now, and I abruptly lost interest in the model to drift lazily towards the delicious smell. Food was tantalising at the best of times; after the mad-cap adventure preceding this quiet tourist trip, it was downright hypnotising.

The Doctor, who hadn't noticed me leaving, jogged to catch up halfway to the shop. Even he could see my longing for food; he hadn't eaten himself, not recently as far as he could remember. At least thirty hours. Perhaps more? He wasn't sure anymore. Jogging slightly, he entered the shop just a few seconds before I did, and placed an order before steering me to a booth near the window. My eyes were wide and I caught him watching me, a small melancholy smile on his face.

How long had he been alone before he met me? However long, it had been far _too_ long.

I didn't speak as the food arrived and he slid the plate to me first. They looked like round, penny-sized discs in a strange murky-purple and I eyed them suspiciously, before nibbling the end and pulling a face. "They smell better than they taste," I informed him, and he grinned.

"Here," he handed me a shaker, "sprinkle, and try again."

I obeyed, and this time my eyes fluttered closed as I bit into the crispy skin, savouring the taste and nodding. "I love this place."

"It gets better." I met his gaze and read the excitement there. "They have their own version of Christmas here. I thought- since you'll miss it on Earth- you'd like to see it here." His gaze slid from mine and he fiddled with his food, pushing it around with a finger as I watched him with a broad grin.

I bit into another _brorth_ before replying, making him wait almost to the point where his expression dimmed and he nodded sadly, mistaking my silence for a refusal. "Of _course _I would!" I cried, shaking my head at him. "Idiot- you honestly think I'd refuse?"

"There's an awful lot of dancing involved," he warned, grinning and leaning back into his seat, more relaxed than I'd ever seen him.

I scoffed, doing a silly little jig in my seat. "I'm a _fantastic _dancer!"

"The party can get very dangerous." His eyes were sparkling despite his warning tone and I knew he wasn't really trying to warn me off or change my mind, but was teasing. Again. As always.

I liked when he teased me this way; it made the friendship seem more genuine, more real. Our eight months together seemed much longer, but in an incredibly good way; I'd never felt so close to someone else so quickly and while it sometimes scared me, it was also the best feeling in the world. "Life is dangerous," I replied nonchalantly, gesticulating with my hands and probably being far too overt with it, but the Doctor never stopped grinning and it egged me on.

"You could be killed," he said; there was a note of seriousness in his voice and I made a conscious effort not to react to it. He could get very dark very quickly when something happened to remind him of my temporary mortality, and if I reacted he'd only put another figurative strike of guilt on his conscience. Idiot alien.

"So could you," I reminded him, finding it harder to not react to the thought of _his _death than mine. I'd become so attached to him… I suppose, in some small way, I loved him. That terrified me, to be honest, the thought of how deep my loyalty ran. It scared me to think of how far I'd go to keep him safe.

The Doctor's smile by now was threatening to break his face, even though he wasn't strictly smiling from amusement. Oh, mirth was present in bucketloads, but the incredulous nature of it was started by the fact that I had yet to say an actual yes and he was probably already planning where we'd go first, listing all the places he wanted to show me in his head.

"That's a yes, then?" he asked, just to be sure. I rolled my eyes when he held his hand palm-up on the table, wriggling his fingers when I glanced at it. The _brorth_ were nearly entirely gone now and I found I wanted more, but the expression on his face was enough to keep me stuck in my seat. I'd committed myself to travelling with him from the instant I set foot on the TARDIS, and though he still sometimes scared me half to death- his anger, his fury, but also his incredible mercy and his _sacrifice- _I gently placed my palm atop his. "That's a yes," I confirmed, nodding to ensure the point got across.

The Doctor smiled, and tugged me up and out the door. There was so much to see and though we had all of time and space at our disposal, why not begin straight away?

"So, you said you're a dancer? Brilliant! Let's go see your first Smirlancean Festival! Oh, I hope it's a purple one- you're gonna love it!"

We bolted through the streets, the first sun sinking slowly down. Apparently, the moment the bottom curve touched the horizon, we had ten minutes of daylight remaining before the second sun went down; then, the party would _really _begin. The streets were lined with banners and streamers, the windows and shopfronts done up in lights and flimsy decorations that reminded me so much of the Earth ones. Aside from the general colourisation and the fact that the locals were all eight-feet-tall, plus, it _could _be Earth. The gravity here was thinner, a fact that I noticed in my ability to run faster for longer, but the air was thicker. I'd been airsick for a good hour when we first landed. The Doctor had laughed at me as I floundered about, trying to follow his instructions and take 'slow, easy breaths'.

Reaching the centre square of Smishea, the Capital City of Smirlance, the Doctor and I weaved in between the locals to get right down the front. They didn't have a Christmas Tree, as this festival was a completely different celebration, but they had a giant wooden sculpture of their god which was painted with prayers and praise. They'd light it up, and since the chalk was made of sulphur and copper, the flames burned blue and green and supported the belief that their god was listening.

As the ten minutes of twilight began, so did the singing. It was throaty and raw, and sounded quite painful; the Doctor and I hummed along, him stopping halfway to point out various traditions and important people who were arriving. We saw the Prince and Princess, the Holy Man, and the Queen Royal all appear in full dress, flowing fur-lined coats in brilliant reds and oranges. The four of them made a united ring around the wooden statue, hands linked. The rest of the congregation echoed them, all of us linked up in huge circles surrounding him. I was sure that we'd look quite spectacular from above; I made a note to come back and see, one day. In the final minute, as the second sun rapidly followed the first, the circles began to move. The royals moved clockwise, the second circle counter-clockwise, and so forth. The Doctor and I had to run to keep up; one of their steps equalled two of ours.

"Get ready! It's coming!" the Doctor shouted over the roaring of the crowd. All at once, every single person stopped moving, stopped singing, everything. Silence fell- there was a flash of white light, a faint _whoosh _of ignition, and suddenly the statue was on fire. The heat was searing; the flames flickered between red, orange, green and blue, a rainbow of colours stretching at least twenty feet up in the air.

I felt tears sting my eyes as a song started up again, this one softer and sweeter and so much more heart-wrenching than the first. This one reached into my very soul and tore strips off it; my hand, encased in the Doctor's, squeezed his fingers as I sniffled and glanced up at him, wanting so much to say thank you but knowing no words could ever describe what I was feeling.

From the broad, delighted grin and light squeeze I received, no words were needed. Except three; three most important, wonderful words that could only be said at times like these.

"Merry Christmas, Doctor."

As I turned my attention back to the celebrations, lilac-scented snow started to fall.

* * *

**Merry Christmas, all of you- thanks for reading!**

**One week to go until the sequel to _Changing Me _is released! Here, for your reading pleasure, is a sneak-peak of what's to come in _Don't Look Back, _set to be published on January First!**

* * *

Time is fickle. It may seem like a straight line when it's really a giant scribble. It changes perceptions; it flies away when there's fun to be had, yet lingers and crawls when there's nothing to do. There's always more time, but it's never enough.

The streets of London were busy, being a few hours after lunch on a Tuesday as it was. Nonetheless, not a single pair of eyes wandered to a bus stop with a broken backing, behind which a blue box had mysteriously appeared. It hadn't been there on the Monday, and it probably wouldn't be there on the Wednesday. The box appeared and disappeared at random, but always came to that same spot.

Apparently, the chip shop across the street sold the best in the universe.

That is, if you were to ask the two occupants of that box, both of whom stumbled out into the waning daylight, hand in hand, laughing so hard it brought tears to their eyes and made their lungs burn. Coils of smoke drifted out from the box behind them, smelling slightly of burnt rubber, but neither seemed concerned about it. Indeed, they hardly seemed to notice anything outside of one another, and the conversation they were intensely involved with.

"Did you see his face as we left?" the Doctor cried, his voice going up an octave as he attempted to re-enact the scene. In stitches beside him, it was all I could do to stay upright, recalling the Bleecratt Lord and how he had turned all shades of angry green when the Doctor politely informed him that he was not eligible to become a concubine. We'd thought it was me the Lord was after, until he rudely shoved me out the door to discuss... "business" with the Doctor.

If the fact that we were now banned from that planet due to the Doctor's apparent sex appeal wasn't funny enough, watching the Time Lord bulge out his eyes and blow a raspberry certainly was. His ears wriggled. "I was waiting for him to order your head off!" I giggled back, gasping for breath in between words.

He swung our hands between us as we crossed the street, the scent of chips already luring us in, two helpless fish on a line. "Beheading? Oh, no, no! They haven't had a beheading on Bleecratt in centuries. Don't be so barbaric," the Doctor scolded me, mock-serious as he winked when I raised my eyebrow at him. "They boil you and eat you."

"I think he would've eaten you without the boiling, since you're so nummy-nummy." I couldn't believe I'd said it, but someone had to. I'd put up with days of watching the aristocrat fall over himself trying to impress the Doctor, while the man himself remained purposefully oblivious to the intentions, when all we wanted to do was get out.

The Doctor shot me an affronted look, shaking his head at my poor impersonation of a big, purple beach-ball of a Lord simpering over the Doctor's very footsteps. "You are disgusting," he informed me cheerfully, as we took our usual booth by the window. He liked watching the people and I just wanted the food, so I didn't care where we sat.

"Like you're not," I retorted, recalling with a brief look of horror the mess he'd made of the dinner the night before. We'd stayed in the TARDIS, neither of us feeling up to facing Earth, and he insisted on trying to cook me a delicacy from a planet I couldn't even pronounce. What we ended up with was molasses-thick sludge that smelled of dead fish. The Doctor had insisted that it tasted better than it smelled and promptly devoured the lot, as my appetite had ducked for cover and my poor stomach did somersaults of protest.

"That dish was a delicacy from the Ovyorus Cluster in the Endula System. Show a bit of appreciation for fine cuisine, you uncultured ape."

* * *

**Aaand that's a wrap! Enjoy your holiday period, everybody, and stay safe; whatever you're up to!**

If you're interested, head over to Twitter and follow me. My handle is Kate_Dear

I have a facebook page! Web address is as follows (remove spaces):

www. facebook pages/ MisfiredSynapse / 103035179805745?ref=hl

And my Livejournal Account, within which I post semi-regular updates and occasional fan-art:

m1sfiredsynapse .livejournal

Finally, I ought to mention that I'm heading to London in April next year. PM me ideas of what I should do/see, if you like- I've got a month to fill!


End file.
